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Pretty Good Hat

Good Analysts are Doing it By Hand

John Foreman on surviving data science hype:

You know what can keep up with a rapidly changing business?

Solid summary analysis of data. Especially when conducted by an analyst who’s paying attention, can identify what’s happening in the business, and can communicate their analysis in that chaotic context.

Yep. We need infrastructure and cool tools to help us get the data we need, when we need it, but just as important is defining what that need is and having a deep understanding of what our information tells us. Without that, at best, we have lots of pretty pictures of trend lines, but no plan.